News:

In the next few days, I will convert the Forum to a new Forum Software.PLEASE SAVE YOUR OLD PRIVATE MESSAGES. IF YOU STILL NEED THEM AND THEN DELETE THEM, AS THE PRIVATE MESSAGES WILL NOT BE CONVERTED TO THE NEW FORUM AND WILL BE LOST THEN !Please still a bit patience, I still must test a few things before the conversion will be taking place.Many thanks for your help. Regards, Stefan Hartmann ( Admin)

Yes, Leyden jars can be very dangerous. Yes, "static" electricity can charge Leyden jars or other capacitors to very high voltages. Yes, if you aren't careful you can kill yourself (or your cat) with a Leyden jar charged to high voltage. Yes, be very careful and use a carefully made discharge wand (sometimes called a "Jesus Pole") to discharge your Leyden jars before you handle them. Yes, if you have no knowledge of or experience with High Voltage -- do some studying and be _very careful_. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bd2xUhf-T5U

Yes, Leyden jars can be very dangerous. Yes, "static" electricity can charge Leyden jars or other capacitors to very high voltages. Yes, if you aren't careful you can kill yourself (or your cat) with a Leyden jar charged to high voltage. Yes, be very careful and use a carefully made discharge wand (sometimes called a "Jesus Pole") to discharge your Leyden jars before you handle them. Yes, if you have no knowledge of or experience with High Voltage -- do some studying and be _very careful_. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bd2xUhf-T5U

I've been trying for a few days now to use a continues sparking BBQ electric arc lighter to charge up some electrostatic stuff.

What ever i try.. it seems not to work.. anybody any suggestions ? Starting to get frustrated.

I put some wires on it ..and that works.I can spark with them, but could it be possible there is no Pos and Neg.. I tried charging Leyden Jars, I tried making a electrostatic bell.. I tried a simple electrostatic motor.. but nothing seems to charge ...turn or move.

Anybody know how these lighters work?Could it be they change polarity so nothing gets charged?

I also have a plasma ball, could i use that power supply out to use for producing some HV charging ?

PS I made a electroscope to test charge. And it works with pvc and cloth. So i can test.. but i guess the lighter circuit is somehow wrong for this ?

It is true, in certain situations, static electricity can beDangerous.Most people are not able to create these situations.And therefore, it is safe to handle. Might scare you ormake you jump a little. But I would consider it harmless.

When it comes to Leyden jars, the point of danger lies inA range of potential somewhere between 40k and 200kVAnd it's not just the voltage that kills you. It has to do withThe discharge current. Which is a factor of the distance between the plates of the Leyden jar. The closer the chargedplates are to one another, the more dangerous the discharge.also there is a factor of the insulation on the jar, and how the charge leaks from it.Once you get above a few hundred thousand volts, the danger scales off due to the surface effect. You body won't takecurrent from extremely high potentials, it just rides on your skin.Tesla was approaching megavolt potentials, which creates "safe"LightningThere are images of this that show tesla and his visitors beingstruck by this high voltage lightning without any ill effects.

Modern experimenters have replicated this on a much smaller scale.-------------------------------------------------------------------------

Now let's talk about your crystal.The "generator" inside the clicker is activated byA spring loaded Hammer.When you press the button, the spring builds up tensionOnce it gets to the release point the spring flies openSending the hammer towards the Quartz.This accounts for 90% of your time you took pushing thebutton. No energy is output during this time.The hammer strikes the crystal for but a couple of microseconds.One quick pop that causes stress on the crystalline structure.When that stress relaxes back to the crystals normal rest stateThat is when the electricity is converted from physical force.This conversion takes only nanoseconds. Almost 1000 times fasterThan the hammer that caused the stress.

So your first issue is the short pulse compared to the long time ittakes you to push the button again.

The second issue is these devices are low voltage, high current.Generally between 500V - 2kVBasically it takes a lot of clicks to try to do what you are doing On top of that, you are in a race against leakage.

I think you have the wrong lighter in your mind, not sure, mine is electronic. Not piezo. Here is a little example of the spark frequency I get: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZh6gtL7rTE( Don't mind the setup or the rotating, thats not from the HV , i gave it a little push )

I have almost continuous sparking, but it looks like i can not charge a body. or something alike with it.

What i want is a power-source to drive some experiments as electrostatic motors.

Preferable from a household hack.

Do you think i could have more succes with a plasma ball driver ?

Excuse my ignorance, but would i be theoretically able to charge for example a Leyden jar with such a lighter ?

I love that Lidmotor videoThat's the one that had me thinking aboutAn electrostatic QuMoGen. 😇

Yeah A/C switching circuit - it has its usesBut maybe not what you are going for ATM.Maybe shelf that as an a/c power source later.

Leyden jars should increase performance of theMotor

Wel the fun now starts.

The object (Utron) I made as a Leyden jar.The one above is aluminium on the outside and filled with salt water and the aluminium axle is the inner electrode I've made a few different models, with all different charastics, now ready for testing.

I have done a lot of research on the principle, and i think there could be some nice effect.I do however SUCK in electronics ; )

Smoky.... I hate to be overly critical with someone who is actually experimenting, but I have to jump in here.You've made several statements during your work with static electricity that are, frankly, wrong.Such as what you have said here about Leyden jars and high voltage.

I'd hate to see anyone hurt or killed because they think that a Leyden jar charged to hundreds of kV will be "safe".

Skin effect has to do with frequency, not voltage. DC currents at high voltage, backed by even relatively small capacitances,can be _very dangerous_ indeed. Charge a decent Leyden jar or bank to hundreds of kV and discharge that across your body: you willprobably die. However, I seriously doubt that you have ever encountered voltages in the hundreds of kV range with your setups. But Ihave a lot of experience with such voltages (even to the point of nearly killing myself a couple of times.) If you have a system that can sustain hundreds of kV long enough to charge a Leyden jar to that voltage, you have something that could indeed be _deadly_ withonly a few tens or hundreds of picoFarads of capacitance, easily within reach of a good Leyden jar.

Something like a good, well-tuned Tesla Coil can make hundreds of kV and this can indeed be safe when touched because the _frequency_ of the AC current is high enough that the current is confined to a thin "skin" and doesn't pass through the body butrather goes over the outside. But this is an AC effect having to do with high frequency and is very different from how DC current at HV works.

You've talked several times about "frequency" of your Voss machine. This is a _DC_ machine (although it may sometimes reverseits charge polarity). You must not mistake the frequency (rate) of spark discharges with the frequency of an AC signal or current. A higher DC current means a greater _rate_ of spark discharge, for a given capacitance and voltage (gap). If you also have substantialinductance in your setup (em inductance not es) then _during the individual sparks_ you may have some AC ringing, but you cannot see this without an oscilloscope, and this will not protect you in the event of an accidental discharge through your body.

You are safe at low ES voltages if capacitance is small. But even with "small" capacitance, DC voltages in the hundreds of kV can bevery dangerous.

The "good news" is that it is difficult to make a proper Leyden Jar that will actually hold off hundreds of kV without puncturing or shorting. That's whyI prefer to use strontium or barium titanate doorknob capacitors in series stacks. A stack of ten, 1200 pf 40 kV doorknobs will stand off 400 kV reliably.But you'd have to be crazy to try to deliberately take a discharge from such a stack through your body. You can easily die from only a few Joulesof energy through the chest.

Carry on, you are doing good work, but... carry on _SAFELY_ and beware of capacitors charged to EHV.